Customer Reviews

The Art of Gaman: Arts and Crafts from the Japanese American Internment Camps 1942-1946

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The heart and spirit of the japanese internees continued to shine within the walls of their confinement. They found beauty and admiration of beautiful things living in desolate and inhumane conditions of the prison camps. This is a understated book with touching stories to tell.

This book shows artwork done with minimal supplies in the Japanese-American concentration camps of the western US during WWII. The images are high quality, in color, and very thought-provoking.

This work documents the extensive detainment of Japanese
citizens during the later period of WWII. These prisoners
were kept in whitewashed horse stalls in California, Oregon
and the State of Washington. The camps emphasized education
including arts/crafts with a shortage of teachers.

Fine works of art include:
- The Natural Form of a Snake by Obata
- Kobu by Matsuhiro
- A Bonsai Notebook by Iseyama
- Shell Broaches and Corsages by Iwa Miura and Shintaku

The volume is a solid value for the price charged. It is a must
for serious students of WWII and historians everywhere.

Delphine Hirasuna is to congratulated on producing a fascinating and moving tribute to the 120,000 Japanese who were interned, firstly in makeshift Assembly Centers for a few months then in Relocation Camps until 1946. It took until 1988 before a Presidential apology was forthcoming for the blatant violation of their civil rights by the federal government.

I think the strength of the book is the background to why the art and craft was produced. Hirasuna explains the rounding up process and public perceptions towards the Japanese only a few months after Pearl Harbor, the locations of the camps (as remote as possible it seems) and daily struggle in a hostile environment.

On page seventeen there is a map of the US and some camp statistics including a reference to Crystal City in Texas which bizarrely held 2264 ethnic Japanese from Latin and South America (1811 from Peru) who, having been forcibly taken to the camp, were then accused of entering the country illegally! After the war the Peruvians were not allowed to return home until Congress sorted out this injustice in 1953.

Look at the paintings, sculpture, craftwork and furniture and be amazed that most of it was created from whatever materials were available, discarded wood, sacking, vegetation, rocks, shells and anything that could be cut, woven or molded. My favorites are twenty-two brooches made from shells, ribbon and wire and they look just stunning. On pages 104-5 you can see a Buddhist shrine, five foot tall, with the most intricate carvings and hard to believe that it was probably made from firewood.

In the back of the book there is some background information about Japanese history museums and a short bibliography which strangely misses out Manzanar: Photography by Ansel Adams, Commentary by John Hersey. A more recent look at the subject is Impounded: Dorothea Lange and the Censored Images of Japanese American Internment a portfolio of photos by Dorothea Lange. Unfortunately the reproduction and design of the book don't do the photos justice.

The Art of Gaman is beautifully printed and designed (by Kit Hinrichs of Pentagram) and a suitable tribute to creativity in hard times.

***FOR A LOOK INSIDE click 'customer images' under the cover.

Human beings have an amazing capacity for art. In even the most dire circumstances, when it seems like they wouldn't have the energy to do much more than lay down and die, they create. That is the story of "The Art of Gaman."

I am old enough that I never learned about the Japanese internment camps in school. The first I ever heard about them was when I saw the film Come See the Paradise, and I was shocked. Not only that the US had also had concentration camps, a word I associated only with the nazis, but about the fact that it had been so hidden from my history books. Thankfully, that is not the case now, and people are much more aware of the suffering the Japanese people and their children, many native-born Americans, suffered during the racial paranoia of WWII.

But "The Art of Gaman" is not about the suffering. It is about the living, about the beautiful things that people did and made in order to make their situation more bearable. Forced to leave their homes with nothing more than they could carry, forbidden objects of metal, the people found themselves in cold, comfortless surroundings, far from the things they knew and loved. It started simply at first: a chair to sit in. a toy for a child. a picture to remind them of what they had lost. From there, it became a way to survive. Long hours with nothing to do were filled by making beautiful things. Those who had skills and knowledge set up classrooms to teach what they could. The making of art was even encouraged by the prison guards who saw the calming effect it had on their captives.

Few of these items survive. They were considered of little value, and when it came time to return home most of them were abandoned in favor of more practical items. But thankfully, some creations were cherished and kept, making up the collections of items found in this book. They are not all beautiful, and the craftsmen and women were not all highly skilled, but each object tells a story of the person who made it.

Many of the objects here are practical, like a Bonito Shaving Box created by Ushijima Toki on page 92. It is a simple thing, but necessary to make the dried fish-flake shavings essential to the Japanese soup dashi that would have tasted so much like home. Some, like the Senninbari Vest given to George Matsushiita on page 91, are even more evocative. Stitched by a mother to give to her son to go off to fight for a country that had imprisoned his mother. A Minnie Mouse figure fashioned from shells by Miura Iwa on page 114 shows that their was still hope in their hearts for the American dream, embodied by a familiar animated character. A Shamisen cobbled together from spare wood on yarn on page 87 shows that a love of music kept some
hearts alive.

I am glad that Delpine Hirasuna hunted down these precious objects and put together this book. I was not alive during the time when these were made, but being married to a Japanese woman I realize this in a different time, this could have been my wife and children stripped of their rights and unlawfully imprisoned. It would be nice to think that those paranoid times were long gone, but events of the last decade have shown that this simply isn't true.

One last thing: This book is called "The Art of Gaman" to reflect a Japanese term meaning to persevere in hardship. But I see this more as "The Art of Gambaru," meaning to give it your all and to do your best, even in the most difficult of circumstances.

This book will have you in tears with its beauty in the face of diversity so extreme you can't imagine unless you've talked with a survivor of these internment camps. The level of the art is very fine, museum quality. It is hard to believe they had to scrounge the materials from dump piles and surplus. Anyone who doesn't think art can save lives should get this book.

This large format book is beautifully presented. Stories from Japanese Americans who were removed from their homes and interned in camps during World War II accompany gorgeously rendered photographs of items they fashioned from scrap materials. From chairs and kitchen utensils to art objects, each is an example of "gaman," living with grace and dignity in the midst of hardship.

This book shows how Americans detained into concentration camps only because they were of Japanese ancestry, adapted and survived by engaging in doing art works and crafts, among young and old. Art is a universal human trait. The book has beautiful photos of the works made out of salvaged materials; scrap lumber, paper, cardboard, which were only the stuff available to them. Professional artists among them and amateur craftspersons held workshops and classes to engage their fellow suffering victims in this activity so that they could endure with dignity the years of their encarcaration. The beauty of these works are an inspiration to all of how to survive unjustified imprisonment,wherever that may be. And, it should remind Americans of our shame of what we did in 1942 to our citizens. Hopefully, never again. John Hotchkiss, PhD.

The book is beautifully done. It reflects the spirit of the Japanese in the American Internment Camps. They took what was part of their environment and created works of art.

unbelievable arts/crafts from a period of time (shamefully painful for some) that these groups created. i'm personally drawn to folk art of all kinds and appreciate this book. too historical NOT to have been produced.